Four Essential Elements of the Obligatory Scene

The obligatory scene is the one the audience has been anticipating, where the Protagonist confronts the Antagonist in a final life-and-death struggle.  It’s the showdown between good and evil, the villain and hero, or the boy and girl.

The scene is referred to as ‘Obligatory’ because it cannot be omitted.  Imagine what any of your favorite films would be like without the Obligatory Scene.

Instead of confronting Buffalo Bill, Clarice Starling decides she’s had enough of this serial killer stuff and goes out for a manicure and Haagan Daz…

Instead of joining the Rebellion and taking on Darth Vader and the Death Star, Luke Skywalker decides this ‘Force’ business is nonsense and goes home to Tatooine….

After a failed escape attempt, instead of facing Commodus in the Coliseum, Maximus decides he’s tired of fighting and kills himself in his cell…

A successful Obligatory Scene consists of the following components:

1. Links to the Inciting Incident
When the script’s major dramatic question is asked, the reader begins to imagine the answer.  The inciting incident creates an image of the obligatory scene in the reader’s mind. In other words, the inciting incident foreshadows the climax and sets-up the payoff the audience is expecting in the obligatory scene.  It is a promise you make to the viewer.

2. Involves the meeting of conflicting forces
Regardless of genre, the story climax involves the confrontation between the conflicting forces.  In a traditional hero/villain or protagonist/antagonist story, the opposing forces (Buffalo Bill/Clarice Starling, Commudus/Maximus, Luke Skywalker/The Empire, represented by Darth Vader) engage in the final battle.  In a romantic-comedy or love story, the forces that kept the lovers apart experience their final clash and the lovers either win or lose.  In more interior-type dramas, the transformed antagonist is tested by the opposing force.  For instance, in the film Tender Mercies, the protagonist, alcoholic Mac Sledge, is transformed by his relationship with his new wife.  The Obligatory Scene then will test his transformation from honky-tonk alcoholic to sober husband. Screenwriter Horton Foote creates a scene (the death of Mac’s daughter) to propel the protagonist into conflict with the opposing force (his own inner demons).

3. Defines the theme of the film
The Obligatory Scene is also where you prove your story’s premise.  The climax scene tests the protagonist, allowing the writer to dramatize how it transforms or fails to transform him.

4. Gives the audience what they expect in an emotionally satisfying way
The final outcome must be inevitable.  It must be honest to the premise and conflict you have set up. The Obligatory Scene delivers what the audience expects, in an unexpected way!  The audience expects Harry and Sally to end up together, but the Obligatory Scene is still satisfying to view because Nora Ephron wrote it in an unexpected way (Sally telling Harry she hates him, followed by a kiss).  The audience expects Maximus to win, Michael Corleone to eliminate his enemies, and the Terminator to destroy the T-1000.  What the audience doesn’t expect is Maximus to die in the process, Michael Corleone to kill his own brother and the Terminator to sacrifice himself – yet, all these outcomes are inevitable, true to the premise of the story, and emotionally satisfying for the viewer.

Posted: September 1st, 2009
at 10:11am by Laura

 Tagged with climax, inciting incident, obligatory scene, screenplay writing, screenwriting, writing a screenplay
 Print This Post

Categories: Scenes & Sequences

Comments: 1 comment

 Digg This Post |  Save to del.icio.us |  Share on Facebook |  Tweet This |  Stumble This |  Subscribe by RSS |  Print This Post